Abstract
Recently, design and fabrication of electrochemical sensors have received huge attention because of their high sensitivity, cost‐effectiveness, good selectivity, simple processing, and low detection limit. Herein, we have fabricated zinc oxide (ZnO) hexagonal plates/reduced graphene oxide (rGO) composite under benign approach. Different characterization techniques and approaches such as XRD, SEM, EDX, UV‐vis, and XPS were utilized to authenticate the formation and phase purity of ZnO/rGO composite. Further, we have modified active surface area (3 mm) of bare glassy carbon electrode using ZnO/rGO as electro‐catalyst (electrode material) for the construction of nitrite sensor. This modified electrode (ZnO/rGO/GCE) demonstrated low‐limit of detection (DL) of 0.1 μM with good sensitivity of 2.47 μA/μMcm2. Moreover, fabricated ZnO/rGO/GCE exhibited excellent selectivity, stability and repeatability towards the detection of nitrite. Additionally, ZnO/rGO was also applied as photo‐catalyst towards photo‐catalytic hydrogen (H2) generation. The ZnO/rGO showed good H2 generation rate of 650.3 μmolg−1h−1 compared to the pristine rGO or ZnO.
ZnO/rGO composite has been prepared under facile conditions. Further ZnO/rGO composite was explored as electrode material for sensing application and photo‐catalyst for hydrogen production.